Master Advanced Git Tricks: Navigation, Rebase, Stash, and Cleanup Cheat Sheet

Navigation – Jump to previous branch

git checkout -

View commit history

# Show each commit on a single line
git log --oneline

# Search all commits for a keyword (e.g., "homepage")
git log --all --grep='homepage'

# Show commits authored by a specific person
git log --author="Maxence"

Undo an unwanted reset

# List all reflog entries (each action you performed)
git reflog

# Reset the HEAD to a specific reflog entry, e.g., the 4th entry back
git reset HEAD@{4}

# Or hard‑reset directly to a known commit hash
git reset --hard <commit-hash>

Clean a messy local repository

# Fetch the latest state from the remote
git fetch origin

# Switch to the main branch (commonly "master" or "main")
git checkout master

# Reset the local branch to exactly match the remote
git reset --hard origin/master

Compare a feature branch with the main branch

git diff master..my-branch

Customize commits

# Amend the most recent commit with a new message
git commit --amend -m "Better commit message"

# Add new changes to the previous commit without altering its message
git add . && git commit --amend --no-edit

# Create an empty commit (useful to re‑trigger CI pipelines)
git commit --allow-empty -m "chore: re‑trigger build"

Squash commits (interactive rebase)

To combine the last three commits into a single one:

git rebase -i HEAD~3
# In the editor, keep the first line as "pick" and change the others to "squash" (or "s")
# Save and quit (e.g., :wq in vi)

Fixup a specific commit

# Stage the changes you want to add to the target commit
git add .

# Mark the new changes as a fix‑up for the commit two steps back
git commit --fixup HEAD~1   # you can also use a commit hash instead of HEAD~1

# Run an interactive rebase that automatically squashes the fix‑up
git rebase -i HEAD~3 --autosquash   # then save and quit

Run a command on each commit during a rebase

If a test suite fails and you need to locate the offending commit, execute a command for every commit in the range:

# Run "npm test" on each of the last three commits
git rebase HEAD~3 --exec "npm test"

Stash management

# Save all tracked changes with a descriptive message
git stash save "log info"

# List all stash entries
git stash list

# Apply a specific stash and then drop it from the stash list
git stash apply stash@{1}
git stash drop stash@{1}

# Or apply and drop in a single step
git stash pop stash@{1}

Repository cleanup

# Remove remote-tracking branches that no longer exist on the server
git fetch -p

# Delete all remote branches whose name contains "greenkeeper"
# (fetch -p first to prune, then list, filter, and delete)
git fetch -p && git branch --remote | fgrep greenkeeper | \
  sed 's/^.{9}//' | xargs git push origin --delete

GitHub shortcut using hub alias

Treat hub as a thin wrapper around Git to add GitHub‑specific commands:

# Make "hub" the default Git command
alias git='hub'

# Open the repository page in a web browser (GitHub only)
git browse

Handy Git aliases

alias g='git'
alias glog='git log --oneline --decorate --graph'
alias gst='git status'
alias gp='git push'
alias ga='git add'
alias gc='git commit -v'
# Force‑push shortcut
alias yolo='git push --force'

# Weekly stand‑up report helper
git-standup() {
  AUTHOR=${AUTHOR:="$(git config user.name)"}
  since=yesterday
  if [[ $(date +%u) == 1 ]]; then
    since="2 days ago"
  fi
  git log --all --since "$since" --oneline --author="$AUTHOR"
}